Operating OutdoorsAdrian O’Neal ’93 relishes the chance to maintain all of North Carolina’s state parks.

ADRIAN O’NEAL ’93 changed majors at NC State
from engineering to parks, recreation and
tourism management so he wouldn’t have to be
behind a desk. Now he sits at one in an office
in downtown Raleigh without windows—even
though his job focuses on the great outdoors.

Mind you, O’Neal’s not complaining aboutwhat he sees as the best job in the world—helping lead North Carolina’s state park systemas chief of operations. O’Neal manages every-thing related to day-to-day operations in NorthCarolina’s 39 state parks, which cover morethan 220,000 acres statewide. That includesvisitor services, environmental education,natural resource protection, maintenance andlaw enforcement. He’s out in the parks almostweekly. It’s familiar terrain to O’Neal, who hasheld various jobs, ranging from summer parkattendant to park ranger to district super-intendent, during his 22-plus years with theparks system.

O’Neal’s fascination with parks and the
outdoors dates back to his first camping trip,
when he was around

12, at Raven Rock
State Park on the
Cape Fear River near
Lillington, N.C. Just
don’t ask him which park is his favorite.

He’ll sound like a parent asked to choose
among his children.

“All of our parks have unique characteristics,”
O’Neal says. “Unless you’ve visited all 39 of
them you can’t fully appreciate what they all
have to offer.” He knows. Even before moving
into his current job, he’d visited every one.

Few can probably make that claim, but
with 17 million total visits last year alone —
with Jordan Lake and Umstead state parks in
the Triangle leading the way—North Carolina
parks are popular destinations. Yet gone are
the days when parks were places people went
just to hike, camp and fish. Now they also want
to do things like mountain bike or hang glide.

“People have more expectations of whatthey can do,” O’Neal says. “The biggest chal-lenge for the parks is just the variety of thingswe have to manage and the variety of users wehave to manage.” —Todd Silberman P H OTOGRAPHCOURTESYOFADRIANO’NEAL’93

“All of our parks have unique characteristics. Unless you’ve visited
all 39 of them you can’t fully appreciate what they all have to offer.”
—Adrian O’Neal ’93